YOUR VIEW: Early casino referendum would spur NIMBY vote

Thursday

May 29, 2008 at 12:01 AM

I have noticed that Speaker Salvatore DiMasi is supporting the state referendum on the casino issue, and that he has finally indicated his opposition to casinos, not just opposition to the way Gov. Deval Patrick presented the bill, without input from the speaker or Senate president.

STEVE NORTON

I have noticed that Speaker Salvatore DiMasi is supporting the state referendum on the casino issue, and that he has finally indicated his opposition to casinos, not just opposition to the way Gov. Deval Patrick presented the bill, without input from the speaker or Senate president.

I have a concern with a state-wide vote that doesn't already restrict gaming locations to those communities, like New Bedford, that support having a casino within their boundaries.

Most previous Massachusetts polls show 55 to 60 percent in favor and 25 to 35 percent opposed, but when you ask voters to approve casinos or racinos for the state without predetermining the possible locations, you introduce NIMBY (not in my backyard) and negatively influence many of those that might support the taxes, jobs, construction and tourism that casinos would introduce.

New Jersey, in 1974, had such a referendum which, if successful, would have allowed any county to introduce casinos after a second local vote. The referendum failed by 60 to 40 percent.

Two years later, with help from the company I worked for, Resorts International, strong backing from local business, labor, and South Jersey legislators, a total campaign fund of a paltry $1.3 million, and lots of job needs resulting from closed factories, we won the referendum for casinos that were restricted to a dying resort community, Atlantic City.

With other, carefully thought-out additions — the 8 percent win tax going to New Jersey's senior citizens and the disabled (a million New Jersey seniors who might normally be anti-gaming); the prohibition of casino bingo games so that we weren't competing with church bingo; a very strong law to keep out any mob influence and tough investigations of owners, executives and even entry level employees; a mandated fund to assisted affordable housing in Atlantic City and County; minimum percentage requirements for women and minority employment and suppliers; and the assistance of California's Willie Brown to make our case to the largely minority communities of Camden and Newark — we won by over 55 percent, only two years after a 20 percent defeat.

This same scenario played out in Florida, over a 30-year period, with several failed state referendums on gaming.

Finally, several years ago a statewide gaming vote passed in Florida, but this time the referendum restricted slot machines to race tracks and jai-alai frontons only in Miami-Dade and Broward counties.

Broward residents immediately voted for gaming, and have been operating for over a year. Then-Governor Jeb Bush, with his permanent residence in Miami, campaigned against slots, and the Miami-Dade vote failed until a re-vote passed this January.

Even though most voters in Massachusetts may want the thousands of jobs, hundreds of millions in new taxes, billions in construction and millions of new visitors that gaming will produce; offering this vote before determining the host communities will change the vote of many citizens who would not want a casino in their community.

I wonder if Speaker DiMasi knows something about NIMBY, and what a statewide referendum might indicate if every community is in play for a casino project?